Any cat repellent safe for bunnies?

[Heather M]

Hello!  I got a bunny off of a free list (he is my 4th, but the only one I have currently) where someone was giving him away.  He was not litter box trained at all at 1.5yrs. I worked with him the next year, and he was at about 85%.  I got him neutered, and this went up to 98%.  We also had 3 cats, and they all used their OWN litter boxes.  2 of the cats died recently (they were 18yrs old) and we took in 4 kittens.  The bunny and kittens (and 1 remaining senior cat) live in harmony. HOWEVER….the kittens are using the bunny’s litter box. It has newspaper type litter and he is housed at night in the 2x dog crate, otherwise he has free range of the finished basement.  He does enjoy the company of the felines and they play and chase each other.  But every day I am finding cat poop or urine (not a lot) in his litterbox.  We have 6 cat litter boxes with different litter for the cats.  The bunny is using his litter box about 10% now.  He is still going in his cage, but just going on the ground and not in the litter box or next to the litter box.

My question is……has anyone else had this issue, and is there something I can do to repel the kittens from using his box that is safe for the bunny to be around, and wont repel HIM? They are smaller than him so they can fit where he fits.  I haven’t actually caught anyone doing it, but I find the evidence!

Any ideas?

Thanks in advance!

Heather

[drwil]

Not that I know of. Most repellents are pepper and will turn away rabbits, cats and all sorts of critters.

IMO it is not safe for the rabbit to use the same litter box as a cat. The cat’s feces can be dangerous for a rabbit and people alike. You need to figure out a way for the rabbit to have his own bathroom the cats do not use (and vice versa). When I let my rabbits out the cat litter box goes on top of the rabbit’s cage where the cats but not the rabbit can jump.

Other than that rabbits and cats seem to get along just fine.

[Heather M]

Thanks for the response! This is what I was afraid of. If it was the opposite and the bunny was using the cat litter box (he only likes a particular brand of newspaper litter) I’d have a lot more options. The kittens eventually will be bigger than the bunny, they are between 4 and 7 months old so in a few months I think they’ll be too big to fit into his cage if I prop it open a certain amount or get a covered litterbox with small opening. His front legs are fairly splayed but he gets around pretty well. He’s not going to the bathroom all over the house, he’s going in his cage but just not using the litter box. I want my 98%er back! He does seem to really enjoy the cats and follow them around and they play together so I don’t want to keep them separate permanently. But I might have to for a few weeks to try to get him back on track!

Heather

[cathy66]

Hello, I am looking for an answer to the same problem!

I am wondering if you managed to resolve this issue of your cat using the rabbit tray?

Many thanks!

Cathy

[Benthebunny]

I have an idea. get a litter box big enough for the bunny but too small for the cats. Cover the litter box with his smell. ( take a paper towel, dap some of his pee on it, rub it on the litter box, put some of his poops in) I don’t have a cat so I don’t know if this will work but I hope it does.

[Heather M]

Hello! I didn’t really find an answer but the cats did eventually stop going in his litter box. It’s located in his cage which we leave the door open. My cats were kittens at the time and most of them were smaller than the bunny. One is still smaller than him and is1yr so I don’t expect him to grow more. The bunny has started pooping all over their cat furniture. I put it on some crates so he couldn’t get up there, he has splayed front legs so I thought that he would be unable to jump that high. But I was wrong! Now it’s on two levels of crates so he stays off of it. But he has started pooping all around it. He is neutered and for about a year after the neutering he was really really using the litter box well. He pees in it all the time, and he does poop in it sometimes but a lot of the time he goes next to the cage or next to the cat furniture. I’m hoping now that the kittens have stopped using his litter box that he will get back on track! I also put more litter boxes out so now we have 9 and I put this Cat Attract stuff in there to attract the cats to use their own litter box.

[cathy66]

Hi Heather

Thanks so much for the response. Is the Cat Attract you mentioned a spray?

[Heather M]

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B000PKUUU0/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1472412176&sr=8-1&pi=SY200_QL40&keywords=cat+attractant&dpPl=1&dpID=41jPhnsvrOL&ref=plSrch

It looks kind of like an herb or ground cat nip. They make a litter too and some other products. I haven’t tried anything else. I don’t really know what worked. The kittens had kind of stopped using the wrong litter box before I started using the product. Now if only there was some sort of attractant for bunnies!

[Heather M]

https://drelseys.com/

Scroll down to the rebate icon, good for a free bag of the cat litter!

[cathy66]

Hi Heather

Thanks a lot for the links! I looked this litter up and found a lot of good reviews for it. The only thing that caught my eye was one comment at http://catrepellentguide.com/cat-litter/cat-attract where someone said they litter was quite dusty – did you find this? Its meant to be virtually dust free and as one of my children has mild asthma, I would like to know if it is likely to be an issue.

Thanks again.

[Reesebun]

I’ve read that citrus peels repel cats

[Heather M]

I haven’t actually used the litter yet. They have a bunch of different types for different ailments. It’s funny because I did read a couple things on Amazon where they said it wasn’t dusty, but I’m not sure which one they were talking about. I did order some of the litter for the free rebate but I’ve only used the stuff that you sprinkle in, and the litter won’t arrive until Wednesday.

Do citrus peels repel bunnies too? That’s just what I’m afraid of, I don’t want to repeal the bunny from his litter box while I am repelling the cats! I thought generally that dogs and cats don’t like citrus smells. But I wasn’t sure about bunnies!

[Reesebun]

They do have very sensitive noses.. so maybe that wont work.

[cathy66]

Posted By Heather M on 8/29/2016 4:50 PM

Do citrus peels repel bunnies too?

I read that rabbits like a little orange, and are attracted to the citrus smell so I would not be worries about that.

[Bam]

My Bam likes a segment of orange or clementine. If you peel an orange in the same room, he comes running.

[Author]

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